Focused on working my cloak free from bramble, I hear it behind me: the sound of something very large crashing through the forest towards me.
"This just keeps getting worse!" I yank my cloak free and bunch it up around my waist, sick of wrestling with it in the underbrush.
And then I run. Or try to. When I'm not tripping over the oversized boots, I'm smacking my shins on low branches I can't see in the darkening forest or almost face-planting when the uneven ground throws a dip or hill in my path.
Needless to say, I'm not getting far. At all.
"Dammit!" Frustrated, I stop and look around. Surely there's a better, smarter way of dealing with things. "I swear, LF, if I get eaten by some kind of forest monster . . ." I wrestle with brambles.
Whatever is tearing through the forest after me is almost on my heels. I duck behind the thick trunk of a tree, willing LF to pull me out of this nightmare one more time.
Silence falls around me. It scares me more than hearing my pursuer. I hold my breath and wait, listening for any sound at all.
The forest is utterly quiet, like all the fat birds are watching me, waiting for me to get eaten by a monster more hideous than anything I've ever imagined.
A loud snort over my shoulder makes me jump. The long tusks and snout of a boar scrape the bark off the tree trunk, floating like some sort of disembodied beast a foot above my head.
Its eyes glow an unearthly shade of gray.
Holy hell. My wits at their end, I run.
Branches snap as the thing behind me runs as well. A scrape of something against a tree and a shadow falls over me, one that makes me stop in place.
The boar-headed man uses tree trunks like steps to propel himself upwards, soaring five feet over my head. He's wearing a kilt. Aside from the thickest, most muscular thighs I've ever seen, I catch a glimpse of his round ass as he does a perfect somersault in midair and twists, landing ten feet ahead of me, his unusual fog-colored eyes glaring at me.
I've seen large men on television - wrestlers, The Rock, Jason Momoa - but this man embodies the word huge in a way I didn't think possible. I always found those kind of men sexy. But in person wearing a massive boar head with tusks as dangerous as the small arsenal of weapons he's carrying?
Terrifying. The Shadow Knight of Black Moon Draw is strong enough to snap me in two with a couple of fingers, not to mention the weapons strapped to his back that are bigger than I am.